New PC for SL - Input needed!

I am having a lot of problems with my old pc not playing SL well and know I badly need an upgrade in several areas - So I'm looking into a new one. Here's the one I'm interested in.
Right now SL is very slow in some areas and I regularly freeze. Windlight is completely unplayable. I'd like something that I can use with Windlight with the settings up to a decent level and get good fps. Input VERY welcome as I don't want to buy something I will be disappointed in!

* Intel® Core™ 2 Quad Q6600 Quad Core Processor(2.4GHz,8MB Cache,1066MHz)
* Genuine Windows Vista™ Home Premium Edition
* Digital / Analogue TV Tuner PCI Card
* New MESH Midi-TowerATX Case + 550W PSU
* PCI-Express Mainboard - SLI nForce 650i SLI(C55) - Intel Core 2 Duo/Quad-Core - ATX
* 4GB DDR2 667MHz Memory -( 4x 1GB )
* 500GB Serial ATA Hard Drive with 16MB Buffer
* LightScribe Super Format 20x Dual Layer DVD Writer +R/-R/RW/RAM
* 256MB nVIDIA GeForce 8400 GS - DVI, HDTV, TV-Out
* 19" Widescreen LCD TFT Display with internal speakers
* 5.1 High Definition onboard sound card - 6 Channel Cinema sound
* Logitech S220 - 2.1 Speakers with Subwoofer
* Logitech Cordless Keyboard & Cordless Optical Mouse
* Free Microsoft® Works® 8.5 + 60 Days Microsoft Office Trial
* Free Cyberlink Video Editing Suite - 7 titles (oem)
* 2x IEEE1394 Firewire (onboard)
* 1x Gigabit LAN (onboard)
* Multi-format Memory Card Reader (ATX)
* Free Upgrade to 1 Year On Site* - UK Mainland Only (Repairline Ltd Warranty)

i just got a very similar system and i can tell you, running two clients at once with perfect FPS is no problem at all.

Avoid 8x00-8500 series , get a 8600 or 8800

8600 has twice the memory bandwidth of the 8400,
price diffrence is minimal.

8600 ddr3 memory 1200mhz
Piksel/vertex shaders ; 32
Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec): 22.4
Fill Rate (Billion pixels/sec): 8.64

8400 ddr2 memory 800mhz
Piksel/vertex shaders ; 16
Memory Bandwidth (GB/sec): 6.4
Fill Rate (Billion pixels/sec): 3.6

I second Thili's message about the 8400 card, I have a 256MB DDR3 8600 and it works fine.


Also I suggest using dual channel memory at 800MHz, even if you can only afford 2 GB instead of 4. Assuming the motherboard supports it

Ditch Vista if you can use XP Pro SP2

Don't worry about the memory. With a 1066 FSB you'll only be running it at 533. You can't choose to run it at 800 (or even 667) unless you plan to overclock.

Consider getting a dual-core at 2.66GHz 1333 FSB instead of the quad-core 2.4GHz at 1066. It might save you about $90 and will run SL faster. SL doesn't currently make good use of multiple cores.

They all come with Vista... no option for XP that I can find. Is Vista a problem with SL? That does worry me a little bit.

Vista works fine SL if you don't get the 64 bit Vista and do get a graphics card that has good drivers for Vista. On that, I can vouche for nVidia's geforce 8600GT. Microsoft actually has the correct driver for that card on their Windows Update site. I'm pretty sure most of the 8000 series cards from nVidia have drivers that will work for SL under the Vista operating system......but mostly only the 32 bit file system. Almost every thread I've read about Vista and SL problems are from people not using nVidia cards or are using Vista 64.

I'm running Vista 32 on a quad core Q6600 Intel processor and a GF 8600GT card.....quite well in fact.

The 8400, according to Tom's Hardware, is the equivalent to a Ti 4200 video card that was low end of the Ti4 series of cards in 2001. In other words the 8400 will run SL at 5 frames a second tops in an empty sim. 8600 is the way to go if you can't afford an 8800 series, the 8600GTS would be better than a 8600GT if you can find one.

Actually, Sl can somewhat use multiple threads, i know I can see a substantial gain in performance when I turn on "Use multiple threads" in the Client menu. One huge benefit of the quad core is being able to run 5 avatars in SL at the same time and still have reasonable frame rates. However the dual core 2.66 would indeed be a fine CPU.

Theres no diffrence running 32bit vs 64bit os anymore, they both have drivers, unless youre running on ancient hardware.

Using winxp 64bit & Vista 64bit here, cause i want to use more then 4 gig ram, 32bit cant handle more then 3-3.6 gig ram, depending on setup, 64bit ram limit you wont hit for many many years.